


Lime Green

by Miyuki_scourgeofthefirenation



Series: Colors I Can't See With Anyone Else [1]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aang/Katara - Freeform, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Background Relationships, Bato - Freeform, Bato/Hakoda - Freeform, Family, First Kiss, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Hair Dyeing, Hakoda - Freeform, Humor, Kanna - Freeform, M/M, POV Zuko (Avatar), Time Skips, Uncle Iroh - Freeform, Zukka Relationship, Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, Zutara friendship, just a few years, movie theater, not big ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:47:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26325868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miyuki_scourgeofthefirenation/pseuds/Miyuki_scourgeofthefirenation
Summary: Dyeing your hair is how you find your soulmate. Whatever color you dye it, that color will appear on the ends of your soulmate’s hair.---“It was not the look. For either of us.”“I sympathize, my soulmate used to really like dyeing their hair. I swear, I had every possible color of the rainbow on my head throughout both levels of secondary school.”“What was the last color they dyed their hair?”“Lime green.”
Relationships: Katara & Sokka (Avatar), Katara & Zuko (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar)
Series: Colors I Can't See With Anyone Else [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1935499
Comments: 42
Kudos: 715





	Lime Green

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and welcome to a fanfic I did not think I would write into existence three days ago! Hope you enjoy this! My take on the soulmate AU, with this being the prompt:  
> If you dye your hair, your soulmate’s hair color changes as well  
> -from thepokyone on Tumblr!  
> Find the post here (the whole list is super creative and fun!): https://thepokyone.tumblr.com/post/167243919772/soulmate-au-list
> 
> I made it so that your whole head doesn’t get dyed, only the ends of your hair. Also, it only registers when your soulmate dyes it a different color than their natural color. If neither has dyed hair both just have their own natural color, no other color on the ends. And you can’t try to dye over the color of the hair on the ends, the only way to fully get rid of it is to shave your hair off. Hope that makes sense!

Zuko pulled himself out of bed with a groan. It was the first day of his last year of upper secondary school. Thank god, he thought. He couldn’t wait to be done with this bullshit. One more year. All he had to do was make it through one more year. Then he would be free.

Sort of. There was still his family to contend with, he couldn’t get away from them so easily. And they had been a major part in his longing to get away from the world he currently inhabited after all.

Still, just one more year of keeping his head down and nose clean. Avoiding conflict and attention as much as he could. He stood up and walked through the door connecting the bedroom to his bathroom.

“ **Ah fuck** ,” he breathed as he turned on the light and caught his reflection in the mirror. The ends of his hair were all a bright, unmissable lime green. Looked like avoiding attention was going to be harder than he thought.

* * *

Katara. Zuko had just met a woman named Katara and had already decided she was his new best friend.

It was his first day of work at the movie theater near the university he was now attending. He had managed, with great difficulty, to cease contact with his family and go to the school he wanted, for the program he wanted. After struggling through two years at the university of his father's choice, miserable in the program set for him, Zuko had enough. His father hadn’t taken it well, to say the least.

But he was free and working on doing okay with himself and his life. That meant he had to support himself now. Which Zuko was absolutely fine with, the less he relied on his family the better in his mind. The only one he still had any sort of positive relationship with was his Uncle Iroh, who was graciously letting him stay at his apartment with him while Zuko was in school and saving up money.

Zuko worked at the snack counter, which had been proving more challenging than he would have expected. During a lull one of the ticket counter workers came up to where he was rearranging some merchandise, trying to look busy.

“How’s the first day going?” Zuko turned to find a woman with carefully arranged brown hair grinning at him. Something about her presence immediately put him at ease. She seemed like a comforting person.

“Oh- um-“ Zuko said, demonstrating his superior conversational skills yet again.

She laughed. “Snack counter is always challenging at first. So many hangry people after all. But you’ll get the hang of it. You seem like you can handle yourself.”

“Thanks,” Zuko replied gratefully with a smile. “I needed to hear that.”

“No problem!” The woman waved her hand. “Working at the movie theater is fun, I promise, but it does take some time to get to the point where you stop panicking every nighttime rush. I’m Katara by the way.”

“Zuko. Nice to meet you.” He gave a short bow towards her, after realizing he hadn’t when she first walked over, distracted as he was by trying to keep up his pretense of busyness.

Katara gave a quick bow in return. He noticed a blue necklace dangling against her throat as she did. She shot him another grin as she straightened back up. “I have to get back to the ticket counter, but I do have one piece of advice before I go." Zuko tilted his head to the side, indicating that she should continue. “When trying to look busy, make sure the merchandise you’re ‘fixing’ is actually facing outward towards the customers.” Zuko flushed, and Katara grinned again. She gave a cheeky wave to him as she strode back over to the ticket counter.

He waved in response. Zuko hadn’t had many friends growing up, but he still knew one when he saw one.

* * *

Over the next few years he got closer to Katara, and was accepted into her friend group. Her friends liked to come to the theater a lot, Zuko quickly discovered. They were all nice, and rather outgoing. He found himself drawn in particular to her brother, Sokka. The two became close independently of Katara and the rest of the group rather quickly. He also nursed a small crush on him, though he would rather die than admit that to Katara. She had made it clear that she found anything relating to her brother and his love life gross, and to be avoided at all costs. Zuko happily complied.

* * *

It was Zuko and Katara’s last week of work when the topic of soulmates came up. They had both reached the point where they were ready to move into other jobs, and had somehow managed to make their last week the same to the dismay of their manager. He wasn’t happy to be losing “his best two employees.” Zuko thought he might feel differently if he knew about the amount of time he and Katara spent hitting each other with brooms during down times. (It had to do with a long running game the two had created in Zuko’s first month of work.)

Katara had come up to hang out at the snack counter with Zuko, in a parallel to that first day. “Have you ever dyed your hair?” she asked suddenly, drumming her fingers on the counter.

“No,” Zuko replied, looking up from his phone. “You?”

“Once, I wanted to see if anything would happen with Aang,” she said.

“Oh, did it?”

“No,” she sighed, “I was kinda hoping it would dye his head purple though.”

Zuko snickered, “That would’ve been amazing. Wait- how do you know Aang is your soulmate if he, you know, doesn’t have hair?”

“One time when we were teenagers he grew his hair out for a bit and proceeded to dye it bright orange.” Katara rolled her eyes. “You can imagine what happened next.”

“Aw, I’m sure you two looked gorgeous together,” Zuko laughed again, smirking as he pictured the two with orange hair.

“It was not the look. For either of us.”

“I sympathize, my soulmate used to really like dyeing their hair. I swear, I had every possible color of the rainbow on my head throughout both levels of secondary school.” Zuko smiled, his hand absentmindedly playing with his hair. “They’ve calmed down now though. Haven’t dyed their hair since 2012. Which is kinda a shame since now I don’t know how I’ll ever find them.”

He turned to find Katara with an odd expression on her face. “What was the last color they dyed their hair?” she asked.

“Lime green,” Zuko said. “They kept it that color the whole school year.”

“Right. Right.” Katara murmured, the strange expression still in her eyes.

Zuko frowned, “Katara wha-“

“Gotta get back to the ticket counter,” she cut him off, slapping her hand down against the snack counter, a new, maniacal gleam in her eyes. “See you later! We’ll get ramen with everyone this weekend. Or sushi if you’d prefer. We’ll figure it out! Bye!” She was gone before Zuko even had a chance to respond.

* * *

He had been invited to a family dinner at Sokka and Katara’s childhood home a few months after their last week of work at the movie theater. Their dad, stepdad, and grandmother would be there. Zuko was nervous. Katara and Sokka were two of his best friends in the world, and he wanted to make a good impression on their family. He knew how important family was to both of them.

Zuko had met Bato, their stepdad, once before. He had run into Zuko and Sokka one day when the two were out shopping for a new desk for Zuko. The man had seemed very nice, and was very tall. Overwhelmingly so in Zuko’s mind. Now Zuko worried he hadn’t made that good of an impression then, he had mostly stayed quiet and let Sokka do the talking.

But now he was set to meet the whole group, and hopefully make a better impression. Sokka had told him to dress casually, while Zuko’s instinct was to dress more formally. So he had compromised, wearing a nice peachy-orange colored button down shirt with jeans.

He nervously clutched the flowers he had brought with him as he stood outside the small house, working up the courage to reach out and knock. Were the flowers too stupid of a gift to have brought with him? He probably should have gotten something else. It was too late now though, unless he ran away and pretended to have come down with a fever. All to get out of having to hand these stupid flowers over.

“Zuko!” His head shot up at the sound of the door opening and his name being called. Sokka stood there, beaming brightly at him. A shy smile stole over Zuko’s face. Maybe he could do this after all.

* * *

Dinner had been delicious, and Zuko was pleased at how Katara and Sokka’s family readily welcomed him. Their grandmother Kanna had made an absolutely delicious five flavor soup, and had practically glowed when he complimented her on it. She had also immediately instructed Hakoda to place the flowers he had brought with him into a vase for the center of the dinner table. That had made Zuko practically glow himself.

Following dinner Zuko, Katara, and Sokka had wound up together in Sokka’s room, looking at an old family photo album. Sokka had said it was so he could show Zuko all the old embarrassing pictures of his sister, and she had huffed and made it a point to show Zuko all the old embarrassing pictures of Sokka as well.

Katara had left to take a phone call from Aang about ten minutes into this show and tell, leaving Zuko and Sokka alone in the room. By that point they were beginning to get into the photos from Katara and Sokka’s teenage years.

“Oh, I have to make sure you see the photos from my kendo competitions,” Sokka hurriedly skipped forward through pages of the book. The two had bonded over kendo, with both of them having competed in the past. Now the book fell open to reveal pictures of Sokka in his later teenage years at the competition. Zuko’s eyes immediately snagged on one in particular, showing Sokka proudly holding a small winning cup while surrounded by his beaming family. He had two prominent lime green streaks in his hair, right along the outside edges of his wolftail.

“Sokka,” Zuko asked in a voice that was oddly calm for how very not calm he was currently feeling. “What year was this picture taken?” He didn’t even need to ask. He knew what year it was taken. 2011. The year he had woken up every day finding his hair just as stubbornly lime green as the day before.

“2011,” Sokka groaned, but with a grin on his face. “Not my best look I know.”

“Mmmhmmm,” Zuko hummed, his brain tripping over itself in its fear and excitement. “The light blue was a lot better.”

“It was,” Sokka agreed readily, “went well with my skin- Wait-“ He whipped his head around to stare at Zuko then. Zuko kept his gaze resolutely focused forward on the photo album in front of them. A beat passed.

Sokka spoke again, nervously licking his lips. Zuko’s brain almost exploded, and he wasn’t even looking at the other man head on. “Zuko. How did you know I had light blue hair? I know I talk a lot, but I’m also something of a narcissist and definitely would have remembered telling you about that or showing you a picture. And I didn’t. We skipped over that section of the photo album.”

Zuko considered the question.  _ You could lie _ , the fearful part of his brain supplied.  _ You could tell the truth _ , the excited part of his brain offered.  _ Or you could not say anything at all and grab Sokka and kiss him breathless right then and there on his childhood bed _ , the turned on part of his brain urged.

Apparently he was going for option three, which definitely tracked with Zuko’s history of impulsive decision making. Before he fully realized what he was doing Zuko had already moved his head and brought his lips to Sokka’s. Which was something he had wanted to do for quite a while. So finding out the other guy was his soulmate really seemed like the perfect moment. If not now, when?

And  **Sokka** ... Sokka was kissing him back, just as eagerly. Zuko heard a distant thud, and vaguely registered the loss of weight on his lap indicating that the photo album had fallen to the ground. But one of Sokka’s hands had come up to cup his face and his mouth was so warm, he sort of tasted like the five flavor soup they had for dinner, but Zuko didn’t care at all. Zuko opened his own mouth slightly to deepen the kiss, and was rewarded with a soft sigh from Sokka. It was now the best noise he had ever heard.

They were pulled out of their impromptu makeout session by the sound of the door opening. Which was now the worst noise Zuko had ever heard.

“Hey guys-“ Katara started and stopped immediately as she took in the sight in front of her. Sokka’s hand was still resting on Zuko’s face, his other had at some point come up to grab one of his legs. That leg was now thrown over Sokka’s, so that Zuko was half in Sokka’s lap. For his part Zuko had both his hands in Sokka’s hair. The photo album lay forgotten on the wooden floor, tipped at a strange angle.

The three stayed like that in silence for a few seconds, nobody moving. Katara raised her eyebrows, a slight smile on her face that she quickly hid. She backed out of the room and shut the door without saying another word. Zuko watched the old calendar from 2013 hung up on the back of Sokka’s door flutter from the motion.

“So,” Sokka cleared his throat, his gaze zeroing back in on Zuko. “I’m really enjoying this, but just for clarity’s sake, we are soulmates right?”

“Unless somehow there’s another idiot who dyed their hair 12 different colors in 2009, yes. It’s you.”

Sokka grinned happily at Zuko’s words, “I doubt it. So me it is!”

Zuko snorted, “12 was excessive, how are you not prematurely bald yet?”

“Good genes baby!” Sokka preened. “And I lost a bet. Had to dye my hair a different color for every month.”

“Toph?” Zuko asked, thinking it sounded like the sort of punishment she would inflict.

“You know us so well,” Sokka laughed. Zuko leaned in to shut him up with another kiss. They continued on that way, attached at the mouth, for another few minutes before Sokka broke away.

“Hey, I just realized that you never once dyed your hair did you? I never had more than one color...”

“Yeah, well,” Zuko looked down, examining his hand where it now lay entwined with Sokka’s. “I liked how it looked when it was my natural hair color with your rainbow.”

He looked back up at Sokka’s face. The other man was wearing a sappy expression. “That’s so cute!” He yelped, “How did I get such a sweet soulmate?”

“Yeah, yeah , yeah,” Zuko grumbled good-naturedly, a bit embarrassed. Sokka’s eyes lit up then in a slightly evil way.

  
“ _ You know _ ,” he said slyly, scooting closer to Zuko on the bed. “I could always start dyeing it again...”

**Author's Note:**

> It’s about the Katara and Zuko friendship for me. Also, yes, Katara BEEN KNEW! (She may have arranged that whole thing along with Aang so…)
> 
> For every comment and kudos I get I will give my cat a sweet pet right on her tummy. She’ll purr and it’ll be cute.  
> ~  
> Follow me on Tumblr if you wanna! @miyuki-scourgeofthefirenation  
> I take fic requests, though I make no promises about timeliness in fulfilling them. Hit me up on Tumblr and we can talk about it. No NSFW. Don’t ask, it’s not gonna happen.  
> I upload for ATLA on Sundays!


End file.
